Eminent journalist Bhawana Somaaya launched her new book ‘Farewell Karachi’ in the presence of Javed Akhtar and Shabana Azmi at a club in Mumbai on May 30. The conversation was moderated by Chirag Thakkar of Bloomsbury. The book is based on Bhawana’s family and their migration to India after the partition.
Farewell Karachi book launch: When Amitabh Bachchan broke his 18-year media SILENCE and Bhawana Somaaya’s mother thought he was a FRAUD caller; journalist adds, “My mother also remarked, ‘Shah Rukh Khan’s hair is falling on his face’”
At the very beginning of the event, Bhawana Somaaya spoke of the fear of not having a roof over her head and how this fear stemmed from her family having to leave everything behind in Karachi before migrating to India. As part of the research, she admitted that she wanted to go to the Pakistani coastal city. She said, “I kept thinking that I should go to Karachi. But every time I planned, it never happened. Finally, I thought of Yash Chopra. When he was making Veer-Zaara (2004), Aditya Chopra told him that ‘You don’t have to go to Lahore. You can make the film sitting here’. I told myself, ‘If Yash Chopra can make Veer-Zaara, then I can do this too’.”
Shabana Azmi added to this aspect, “I have known Bhawana for more than 40 years. Ever since I have known her, she has always expressed her desire to go to Karachi. I feel now that she has written the book, she will go to Karachi.” Looking towards Bhawana, she said, ‘You have been longing for it so much but there’s a time and place for everything. Now that this book has come out of you, you will go. I am sure that day will come!’”
When Bhawana’s mother spoke to Amitabh Bachchan
The event ended with Bhawana Somaaya sharing a hilarious anecdote, “As my mother grew old, she had an opinion on everyone and everything. She told me, ‘Javed wears coloured kurtas. I don’t like it’. I told her, ‘He’s not asking for your opinion. He’s wearing what Shabana likes’! To which she said, ‘Shabana visits me wearing cotton sarees. She doesn’t wear jewellery. She’s not wearing diamonds like Rekha’!”
The crowd laughed as Bhawana continued, “Then she asked, ‘Who is Shah Rukh Khan? Why is everyone praising him?’. I showed him on TV. She saw him and said, ‘His hair is falling on his face. I can’t see him properly. He’s jumping from one end to another’.”
She then revealed, “There’s a story about Amitabh Bachchan and her. He didn’t talk to the media for 18 years. I was the first journalist he spoke to. He called on my landline. When I came home, my mother said, ‘Amitabh Bachchan had called’! I thought she mixed up names as he wasn’t talking to the media and I had no connection with Mr Bachchan. I didn’t do anything about it. The next day, when I was away, he called again. He asked my mother, ‘Aapne bataya nahin (that I had called)?’. My mother told him, ‘Meri beti bahut busy rehti hai’! She further said, ‘Kya hai na, aaj kal bahut khota phone aata hai. If you are the real Amitabh Bachchan, then share your number. My daughter has numbers of all film stars’.” The crowd couldn’t stop laughing over this episode.
Bhawana Somaaya continued, “My mother again informed me about Amitabh Bachchan’s call. I was going out for some meeting and again, I didn’t call him up. Finally, he caught me in the morning before my office hours. He told me, ‘Maine do baar phone kiya tha’. I didn’t want to tell him that my mother had told me and I didn’t believe it!”
That was not it. Bhawana further said, “She once said, ‘Anil Kapoor ki wife barabar khayal rakhti hai uske status ka. Barabar gift bhejti hai’. She said this based on the wrapping of the gift.”
Bhawana’s sister speaks up
The event was also a moving one as Shabana Azmi read the excerpt of Bhawana Somaaya’s shocking hardships while travelling to India from Pakistan in a boat. Javed Akhtar, meanwhile, read about the near-fatal accident of Bhawana’s sister Seema Thakkar and how she recovered from it with great difficulty in the 1970s. It was adorable to see Shabana holding the mic during Javed’s narration.
Seema Thakkar was present at the event and she was in tears. Later, she took the mic and admitted, “We were brought up with so much love and so much caring not only by my parents but all my elder sisters and brothers. They were like parents to us. My school meetings have been attended by my sisters. To have 8 children and give them so much love and confidence, aisa kabhi nahin hota. My father was an ordinary man. Yet, he educated everybody to be a double graduate. There was never a situation where I was told, ‘You are a girl and don’t do that’. It’s only when I got married and I lived in a joint family that I realized that I am a girl. I have to eat after everyone eats. Until then, I never thought I was a girl.”
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